The Coke Peddler

Into...cable?

Into the Woods’ Billy Magnussen – soon to be seen as Kato Kaelin on FX’s The People v. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story – has landed one of the three leads on the network’s new drama pilot Snowfall.

To be directed by John Singleton, the pilot serve as an introduction to a potential chronicle of the crack cocaine epidemic in 1980s L.A.

Magnussen will play the black sheep of a very prominent family who is just desperate to forge his own identity and willing to do anything to step from outta the shadow of his father. Anything – including becoming a major player in the nascent coke trade in town.

Photo: Zimbio.com.

Once Upon an After Time

Fourteen years ago, Rob Marshall came virtually outta nowhere (well...from the theater world), with Chicago, and delivered an eventual Best Picture winner that – I will declare – left us all rather riveted.

IMHO, that film was remarkable because A) it simultaneously introduced me to a musical I never knew before and made an instant fan out of me, and B) it stated that the guy was one to watch. Except the Best Director nominee then went on to serve us three turkeys in a row (Memoirs of a Geisha, Nine, and the Pirates fourthquel)....

No joke, I got to thinking Marshall would go down the way of M. Night Shyamalan (y’ know, one great film and that’s it) until two Mays ago, when the big-screen adaptation of Stephen Sondheim’s Into the Woods started to come together.

I thought, perhaps, this would be his redemption. And it is.

Into the Woods is Marshall’s much-awaited return to form, and a ballsy one at that, which shouldn’t come as much of a surprise considering his track record. While the director has had a few more critical and commercials misses than he has had hits, I am happy to report this one’s one for the latter column. He is, if anything, a risk-taker, and I reckon the success he is enjoying with this one is no small measure due to the fact the material at hand, from everything I’ve read about it, was a doozy to adapt.

Cuts that may give fans of the Tony-winning musical pause – cuts that were discussed at length in the months leading to the film’s Christmas Day release – have been made, but by an expert hand...er...pen: James Lapine, who together with Sondheim birthed the Tony-winning musical, handled the screenplay. And Sondheim himself reportedly was quite involved in the making of the film, even writing new songs for it. The goal, Marshall and Lapine explained during a town hall with the cast last month, was to make it all more cinematic.

Whatever they did, I liked!

And how could I not when Into the Woods features an all-star cast led by Meryl Streep as the Witch, the fabu-creep caster of a spell dooming the Baker and the Baker’s Wife (James Corden and Emily Blunt) to a life without children. I should say that Corden, a Tony winner and the new Late Late guy, and Blunt are these so-incredible revelations; he for his undeniable star quality, and she for her impressive singing ability.

Them alone are worth the price of admission, trust. But....

Since the original musical is a mash-up of fairy-tales that (subversively) explores what probably happened after the beloved characters we all know got their happy endings, the film also features Lilla Crawford as a sorta-super-sassy Little Red Riding Hood who comes across Johnny Depp’s oh-so-jazzy-but-dangerous-no-less Wolf; while another young’un, Daniel Huttlestone, follows his winning turn as Gavroche in Les Misérables, with one as Jack, the boy who encounters his greed up the beanstalk. The invaluable Anna Kendrick co-stars as an ambivalent Cinderella, with Chris Pine as her Prince, a charming, if insincere kind of fella.

Up-and-comer Mackenzie Mauzy is a most-tragic Rapunzel, while Jake Gyllenhaal Billy Magnussen is her blinded-by-love Prince.

The film’s first half is pretty flawless. Mr. and Mrs. Baker propel the plot, since they are tasked by the Witch with gathering all these magical objects, which leads them to encounter just about everyone else (all of whom, btw, are eagerly journeying toward their own happily ever afters, their every song revealing fears, doubts, and delusions we never imagined before...). The second half isn’t bad, by any means – but it definitely does vibe differently because now the story unfolds predominantly in the wood (a fantasticscape that can’t help but feel somewhat monotonous) and takes us into this uncharted territory that includes death. (Feel free to gasp.)

And you know what? It was all hella wondrous.

The destination may have been unknown (for a fairy-tale), but, with a company like the one Marshall assembled, it was a near-perfect ride.

If only Depp and his Wolf had been more useful....

My Rating ***1/2

Photo: Walt Disney Pictures.

The Woods Are Alive...

You ready to venture Into the Woods this December?

Ya better be because Meryl Streep is. As are Emily Blunt, someone naked James Corden, Anna Kendrick, Chris Pine, and Johnny Deep. And others including Jake Gyllenhaal Billy Magnussen.

What is this I blog about?

My, the long-awaited adaptation of Steven Sondheim’s musical, which Chicago director Rob Marshall will deliver like a Christmas present for all those who heart all this people and the material exactly on Christmas Day.

Check out the first teaser for the film:



I, for one, am appropriately, well...teased. I know nothing of Into the Woods, so I look forward to learning. I will learn anything from La Streep, at this point.

Money Boy

Get ready to see a whole lot of blond-and-blue-eyed cutie-patootie Billy Magnussen.

Especially now that the Into the Woods prince is headed back to HBO.

Indeed, the Tony-nominated actor (who appeared two episodes of Boardwalk Empire a while back), has landed a regular role on David (Deadwood) Milch’s new drama The Money, playing the middle and favorite child of Brendan Gleeson’s character, a powerful media mogul.

Ray Liotta, Rosemarie Harris, and Mamie Gummer (TV’s The Good Wife) will recur on the show.

Photo: StarPulse.com.

Rapunzel’s New Prince

So...Jake Gyllenhaal pulls out, Billy Magnussen pushes in.

Yeah, I know – that sounds kinda porn-y, but that is what’s happening.

Over at Into the Woods, natch.

I’m talking, of course, about the adaptation of Steven Sondheim’s musical. Gyllenhaal was set to play Rapunzel’s Prince in the Rob Marshall-directed project, but he ended up having to bow when his schedule with another film, the indie Nightcrawler, couldn’t get worked out.

Enter Magnussen, whom you might remember from TV’s As the World Turns or, if you did a theater run to New York last season, from Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike, for which he was nominated for a Tony. He is thisclose to nabbing the role that was meant for the Gyllen-yum and joining a cast led by Meryl Streep and Johnny Depp that also includes Chris Pine, Anna Kendrick, and Emily Blunt.

He also was on two episodes of HBO’s Boardwalk Empire and you probably can still see him on the big screen, in The East, if you hurry to the art house nearest you.

Photo: StyleBistro.com.